Megalópolis

In a simple and short film, with no interview and just imagens and a narrated text, Leon Hirszman provides a wonderful deep discussion of social problems that were already serious in the 70's and would worsen. He makes clear that this model of society dampens life quality and destroys environment. It is not normal that people take so much time inside transportation. If Hirszman were alive today and made a remake, not much would be different from his original documentary. Will some day this documentary become dated?

The process of urbanization and concentration of people in big cities as São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro are brief and carefully analyzed in this documentary by Leon Hirszman. The growing phenomenon of those Megalopolic cities in the 1970's and possible outcome with their social, economical and cultural differences is revealed as a double-egded sword where there's a great evolution that can build a nation its best possible ways, exchange of products and resources but call also create lack of control over its territory, control over population, extensive migration from the rural parts of Brazil to the more urbanized spaces.

The main question asked by the filmmakers relate to the benefits of the growth of a Megalopolis and if or when it can cause a collapse in one nation's system. Hirszman's prediction - possibly done with geographical statistics of the 1970's - projected that by 1984 if São Paulo continued with the then current reckless process of expansion it'd become the world's largest population (not necessarily meaning that it'd become the richest, but one that couldn't get ignored). More than 40 years later and both Rio and São Paulo are part of the most the populated cities around the world, behind New York, Mexico City and Peking.

What is also asked here is about the future of those Megalopolis, with futuristic Alphavilles or Brave New World like modernistic, crowded cities with a distant and alarming social pyramid composed of those who have and those who not. A reality then, a bigger reality now. The film presents wide spaces from both cities but at no point we get to see the usual known places, the most symbolic and important parts of those places - here, we see factories, huge downtown centers, thousands of houses and favelas from amazingly aerial shots. The example of Morumbi doesn't appear in the documentary but it's one that I'll make to give a clear evidence of what we see lately: Morumbi has the largest concentration of poor people of São Paulo, living with many difficulties, but at the center of the neighborhood there's a small circle where some of the wealthiest have great condos, expansive apartments and mansions. One example out of many. Rio also faces similar situations but it grows on the sunny beaches famous all over the world on TV and well-known by its countless foreign tourists. On the hills beyond the classy hotels and residences, it lives a majority that doesn't have much to live with. Those spaces weren't previously design by constructors, engineers and public administrations like Brazil's capital - everything just happened, people kept moving to where the opportunities for a better life could be found and disorder came along when restrictions of where to build constructions, economic speculation and such devasted forests, natural resources and glued population on top of one another.

It's not all about chaos, there's also progress. With each shot that goes by and we are amazed to how see those major cities in the 1970's, the narration talks about the nation's economic and sociologic evolution that was happening in Brazil. No longer a far-off place, almost as if living in the early days of the 20th century; the modern times had come to stay, though back then we still haven't got to the true urban design of more developed countries (but that came with time). A film like "Megalópolis" is more than just document and inform, it's main concern and task is to make viewers to observe perspectives about society's evolution, what can rise and fall when the urbanization process isn't well established; and by looking to the past we can have a different view of our present times and just especulate about improvements to come on the future or the problems and risks that could come from societies changes. 10/10